diff --git a/.gitlab-ci.yml b/.gitlab-ci.yml
index 326cf3e33dfd56c45a558232903740bd4be930a5..a063a87983fd8e72cfec482b84b084b43455b83e 100644
--- a/.gitlab-ci.yml
+++ b/.gitlab-ci.yml
@@ -241,7 +241,7 @@ build documentation:
   script:
     - pip install git+https://github.com/jupyter-widgets/jupyter-sphinx
     - python -m ipykernel install --user --name kwant-latest
-    - make -C doc realclean; make -C doc html SPHINXOPTS='-A website_deploy=True -n -W' SOURCE_LINK_TEMPLATE="$CI_PROJECT_URL"/blob/\$\$r/\$\$f
+    - make -C doc realclean; make -C doc html SPHINXOPTS='-A website_deploy=True -n -W -D jupyter_execute_default_kernel=kwant-latest' SOURCE_LINK_TEMPLATE="$CI_PROJECT_URL"/blob/\$\$r/\$\$f
   artifacts:
     paths:
       - doc/build/html/
@@ -255,7 +255,7 @@ build PDF documentation:
   script:
     - pip install git+https://github.com/jupyter-widgets/jupyter-sphinx
     - python -m ipykernel install --user --name kwant-latest
-    - make -C doc latex SPHINXOPTS='-n -W'
+    - make -C doc latex SPHINXOPTS='-n -W -D jupyter_execute_default_kernel=kwant-latest'
     - cd doc/build/latex
     - make all-pdf
   artifacts:
diff --git a/doc/source/conf.py b/doc/source/conf.py
index d3d7fceb5022796e9fe464cde6def683778bed46..da68f06bf8e783bb9768869317b49dc38bbf7ccd 100644
--- a/doc/source/conf.py
+++ b/doc/source/conf.py
@@ -15,8 +15,15 @@ import sys
 import os
 import string
 from distutils.util import get_platform
-sys.path.insert(0, "../../build/lib.{0}-{1}.{2}".format(
-        get_platform(), *sys.version_info[:2]))
+
+package_path = os.path.abspath(
+    "../../build/lib.{0}-{1}.{2}"
+    .format(get_platform(), *sys.version_info[:2]))
+
+# Insert into sys.path so that we can import kwant here
+sys.path.insert(0, package_path)
+# Insert into PYTHONPATH so that jupyter-sphinx will pick it up
+os.environ['PYTHONPATH'] = ':'.join((package_path, os.environ.get('PYTHONPATH','')))
 
 import kwant
 import kwant.qsymm
@@ -31,7 +38,7 @@ sys.path.insert(0, os.path.abspath('../sphinxext'))
 
 extensions = ['sphinx.ext.autodoc', 'sphinx.ext.autosummary',
               'sphinx.ext.todo', 'sphinx.ext.mathjax', 'numpydoc',
-              'kwantdoc', 'sphinx.ext.linkcode']
+              'kwantdoc', 'sphinx.ext.linkcode', 'jupyter_sphinx.execute']
 
 # Add any paths that contain templates here, relative to this directory.
 templates_path = ['../templates']
@@ -239,7 +246,6 @@ autosummary_generate = True
 autoclass_content = "both"
 autodoc_default_flags = ['show-inheritance']
 
-
 # -- Teach Sphinx to document bound methods like functions ---------------------
 import types
 from sphinx.ext import autodoc